You wouldn't even recognize it!

That's what I want to tell the people who worked early on at the Hinojosa compound about how it looks after Our Father Lutheran Church (OFLC) got their hands on it last week. It just looks so...finished! Dora stopped by to see the progress while I was working with some of the youth on the roof, but I wish I could have seen her face. I'm told she was overcome with awe, gratitude, and excitement over getting to sweep her floors without knowing they'll be covered in another layer of dust within a couple of hours! Besides building the 3rd and final addition for the family, the OFLC gang also worked to connect all the structures on site internally and externally--roofing, sheetrocking, installing extra electrical boxes and running extra Romex, and switching exterior doors for interior ones to create functional "hallways." There are still many tasks that remain out there, but hopefully a group later this summer can go put the final set of finishing touches on it so that the family of 9 can leave their trailer behind for good! Funding is in place for most, if not all, of their utilities by now, so I think they're just waiting for a green light from us.

The back door. St. Paul, Mt. Prospect's addition is in the foreground, and OFLC's is in the background.

Hallway between St. Paul, Mt. Prospect's addition and OFLC's.

Hallway between Trinity, Lincoln's addition and OFLC's.

Whole compound from the backside, facing the road.

This week I'm with University Lutheran Church from West Lafayette, IN. Yesterday we toured White Sands Missile Range, White Sands National Monument, and Old Mesilla, NM, and today they launched into their slate of projects, which includes flooring a trailer in Sparks, and providing health checks & teaching sewing lessons at 3 different sites. All we did in the Kennedy Bros. apartment complex (the 2nd of the 3 sites) was 3 health checks, but it's possible that one man will be diagnosed with diabetes because of what the nursing student was able to glean. His blood sugar was 339, so he's coming back tomorrow for a packet of information and a fasting glucose test. I promise a full blog on their activities highlighting my involvement, but it might be delayed by a few days because I have the opportunity to travel to Sicachique, the location of one of YLM's mission churches deep in the Sierra Madre Mountains, immediately after this week's groups leave. We're leaving on Sunday and will return Thursday morning I think!

Until next time, blessings!